In China, yellow robots deliver snacks to your home

BEIJING, China – Along a quiet residential street on the outer edges of Beijing, a yellow and black cube about the size of a small washing machine trundles leisurely to its destination.

This “little yellow horse” is an autonomous delivery robot, ferrying daily essentials like drinks, fruit and snacks from the local store to the residents of the “Kafka” compound in the Chinese capital.

Equipped with a GPS system, cameras and radar, the robots are seen by their creator as the future of logistics in China, where he says one billion packages will eventually be delivered every day.

Travelling at a less than overwhelming three kilometres (two miles) per hour — a slow human walk — the robot has room for improvement, said one customer as she removed a packet of nuts from its bowels.

“The weak point is that it cannot deliver directly to the door like a human,” said the customer, who does not live on the ground floor.

“But it’s still quite practical. The robot delivers relatively quickly,” she said.

The robot takes advantage of Chinese consumers’ love of cashless payments and smartphone shopping.

China is the world’s biggest online shopping market with more than half of its population making at least one smartphone purchase per month, according to professional services firm PricewaterhouseCoopers. This compares to 14 percent in the rest of the world.

Whether buying electronics or toilet paper, avocados or clothes, Chinese are used to simply tapping a button on their smartphone and getting a home delivery — sometimes several per day.

To get a delivery via the “little yellow horse,” the customer selects the desired products, taps in the address and pays via their phone.

The supermarket staff place the items in the robot, and the robot bustles off.



One billion packages

Liu Zhiyong, founder and CEO of Zhen Robotics, which manufactures the robot, sees a bright future for his yellow creation.

“At the moment, there are 100 million packages delivered every day in China. It will be one billion in the future,” Liu told AFP.

“There will not be enough humans to make the deliveries. We need more and more robots to fill this gap in manpower. And to reduce costs,” added the CEO.

These costs are especially high in the last kilometre of a delivery, where precision is key and a customised service is required to get the product to the front door.

At the moment, the yellow robots in the Kafka compound have little to trouble them, moving along a wide pavement with no obstacles — and no cars.

Weighing 30 kilograms (around 65 pounds) and with a theoretical top speed of 12 kilometres per hour on their six wheels, the robots have four cameras constantly scanning the world around them and a laser tele-detection system allowing them to avoid obstacles.

Liu’s firm has already signed up Suning, a large electronics firm that also runs a network of small supermarkets.

But not everyone is convinced the robots are a long-term logistics solution.

Shao Zhonglin, former deputy secretary-general of the China Express Association, noted they were useful “over a short range.”

“It’s not certain however that they can be a broad solution for the final kilometre of delivery. Because the client still has to come down to get his package,” added Shao.

“Plus the costs remain quite high: buying and maintaining the robots, operating costs, etc.”

‘Not resellable’

But Zhen Robotics is convinced the costs will come down over time.

CEO Liu also says the robot will soon be equipped with the necessary technology to operate a lift, meaning it will no longer be confined to ground-floor deliveries.

In the meantime, deliveries in China are increasingly being made by autonomous means. In recent months, several firms have received the green light to operate drones, either to deliver directly to the customer or to ferry goods between hubs.

And Liu has a warning for anyone trying to vandalise or steal the yellow robot.

“With GPS, we are constantly tracking them, cameras are filming and it can sound an alarm,” he said.

“Anyway, what would a thief do with it? It’s not exactly resellable.”

source: technology.inquirer.net

Recyclable electronic skin can heal, regenerate itself in 30 minutes

The idea of regenerating skin has stepped out of the world of science fiction and into medical and technological reality. Human skin tissue renews itself every couple of weeks, sure, but can it replace itself in just thirty minutes? Probably not. But that’s why artificial electronic skin exists.

The invention of electronic skin is precipitated by manifold reasons, from heightening the senses of artificially-intelligent robots to being used in biomedical implants and minimally invasive surgery. The latest e-skin comes from the University of Colorado Boulder, which created an electronic skin that can heal itself when torn apart, as published in the Science Advances journal last week, Feb. 9.

The catch: it’s 100 percent recyclable and environmentally friendly.

“This particular device won’t produce any waste,” said Jianliang Xiao, co-author of the study and assistant professor of mechanical engineering, said in an interview with The Verge, Feb. 9. “We want to make electronics be environmentally friendly.”

The e-skin is a dynamic covalent thermoset-based e-skin and the first of its kind. Thanks to its thermoset with conductive silver nanoparticles, it can be re-healed when damaged and be fully recycled at room temperature — something that has never been seen in the history of e-skin thus far. Once completely healed or recycled, the e-skin then regains properties similar to the original e-skin, all while being economical and eco-friendly.

As per Xiao, the recycling of the e-skin only takes around 30 minutes at 140 degrees Fahrenheit to 10 hours at room temperature. The healing, on the other hand, is much faster: 30 minutes at room temperature or just a couple of minutes at 140 degrees Fahrenheit.

“We are facing pollution issues every day,” Xiao told The Verge. “It’s important to preserve our environment and make sure that nature can be very safe for ourselves and for our kids.”

A GeoBeats video on the University of Colorado Boulder’s electronic skin may be watched below. Cody Cepeda/JB

source: technology.inquirer.net

Artificial intelligence replaces workers in Japanese company

One of the fears revolving around the development of artificial intelligence rises from the possibility that it may eventually replace humans as a workforce. This fear has now become a reality for a number of employees working for a Japanese company.

To be exact, 34 employees were laid off by Fukoku Mutual Life Insurance and replaced by an artificial intelligence system that calculates payouts to policyholders, reports The Guardian.

The system is based on IBM’s Watson Explorer which the firm believes would increase productivity by 30 percent and help yield a return on its investment in less than two years.

Thanks to the Watson Explorer’s cognitive systems, the company will now be able to read thousands of medical certificates while factoring in length of hospital stay, medical history and surgical procedures to calculate payouts. Of course, all of these will still have to be approved by a member of the staff.

With Japan’s prowess in the realm of robotics, having an AI system takeover human work is, if anything, somewhat inevitable. The Nomura Research Institute filed a report that nearly all jobs in Japan could be done by robots by 2035. Alfred Bayle

source: technology.inquirer.net

Meet Wall-E’s little cousin Cozmo

There have been a number of robotic toys in the market, the most recent of which is the Star Wars-inspired BB8 droid. However, a company called Anki attempts to up the ante with the quirky mini-bot Cozmo.

Cozmo is the the result of combining artificial intelligence, computer vision technology, and robotic movements by former Pixar animators. This little robot comes equipped with dozens of expressions that can be seen on its small display as well as its movements. It also communicates through a collection of beeps and other bot-like noises. Needless to say, when Cozmo gets annoyed, its owner will know in no uncertain terms, reports Engadget.

Artificial intelligence for Cozmo comes in the way that it recognizes and remembers faces, as well as the quirks of the people he often interacts with, just like a dog that remembers that when its owner raises a hand, it means it’s feeding time.

The batteries on Cozmo only lasts for about two hours but the little bot is aware enough to recharge itself on the roll-on charger. Charging typically takes only 10 minutes.

Anki wanted to emphasize the imperfections of Cozmo to make it more relatable and endearing to its human owners. In many ways Cozmo is like Wall-E from the movie of the same name.

Cozmo can be ordered at Anki’s website for $180 and shipping will begin in October. Anki, however, is offering a pre-order discount for early adopters. Alfred Bayle

source: technology.inquirer.net

Self-folding 'smart paper' could lead to real-life Transformers

Researchers from Donghua University in China have developed a graphene-based paper that can fold itself, saying that it could possible be used in robotics in the future, according to a study published in the journal Science Advances.

According to the researchers, led by Hongzhi Wang and Qinghong Zhang, they developed the paper to address limitations on current “polymer active materials.”

The paper moves because some parts of it are hydrophobic and other regions of it are hydrophilic, this puts strain on the paper that causes it to fold, reports Chemical & Engineering News. Heat from an IR laser can be used to amplify the strain.

Devices made out of the graphene paper can, “adopt predesigned shapes, walk, and turn a corner,” and could possibly be used for sensing, artificial muscles, and robotics. — Bea Montenegro/TJD, GMA News

source: gmanetwork.com

Robots to the rescue at international trials in Florida

HOMESTEAD - As a squat, red-and-black robot nicknamed CHIMP gingerly pushed open a spring-loaded door a gust of wind swooped down onto the track at the Homestead-Miami Speedway and slammed the door shut, eliciting a collective sigh of disappointment from the audience.

The robot, developed by the Tartan Rescue team from the National Robotics Engineering Center at Carnegie Mellon University, is one of 17 competing in the U.S. military's Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency's (DARPA) Robotics Challenge.

The agency, which funded basic science research for now commonplace technologies like the Internet and global positioning satellites, hopes the competition will spur the development of robots that can work in places too dangerous for humans.

The challenge was launched in 2011 in response to the meltdown of Japan's Fukushima-Daiichi nuclear power plant after it was hit by a massive earthquake-spawned tsunami. Nearly 160,000 people were forced to flee the area.

The backup power systems needed to cool plant's reactors failed and an emergency team from Tokyo Electric Power Company was unable to enter the damaged reactor building due to the intense radiation.

DARPA sent robots designed to disarm improvised explosive devices in Iraq to Japan, yet by the time workers were trained to use them it was too late to prevent a nuclear meltdown.

"What we realized was ... these robots couldn't do anything other than observe," said Gill Pratt, program manager for the DARPA Robotics Challenge. "What they needed was a robot to go into that reactor building and shut off the valves."

Hydrogen continued building in the days that followed, fueling a massive explosion.

During the two-day trials at a south Florida professional race car track, the platoon of robots faced obstacles designed to mimic the challenges following a disaster. Robots had to cut through a reinforced concrete wall, navigate debris-strewn terrain and locate and turn off leaking valves. Officials from DARPA also disrupted the link between robots and their operators, further simulating a disaster.

The eight teams with the highest scores will be awarded $1 million in funding to prepare for the final round in late 2014, where a winner will take $2 million.

While Carnegie-Mellon's CHIMP eventually opened the door, leading the field on Saturday was a two-legged robot from Japan's team SCHAFT.

Successes in the challenges are about as common as failures. Many robots tumbled off an industrial ladder designed to test sight and balance.

"Murphy's law is very big in robotics," said Daniel Lee, a robotics professor at the University of Pennsylvania and program director for Team THOR, an agile, human-form robot, whose acronym stands for Tactical Hazardous Operations Robot. "It's very difficult to account for all of the uncertainties that you're going to face," he said.

A handful of teams, including ones from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Lockheed Martin, used a six-foot-two-inch, 330-pound humanoid robot named Atlas that DARPA contracted from Boston Dynamics, a company that was spun out of MIT in 1992 and recently acquired by Google.

A team from NASA's Johnson Space Center competed with a robot called Valkyrie covered in white plastic and vinyl, looking like a human wearing a robot suit.

Some robots looked highly mechanized, while others had four legs and resembled a dog.

"The goal is to make it comfortable for people to work with and to touch," said Christopher McQuin, NASA's chief engineer for hardware development.

After the final round next year Pratt said there are plans for another robotics challenge, possibly to be hosted in Japan.

For the next advance in robotics, he said, "the amount of intelligence inside the robots needs to be able to handle small tasks."

"We don't want to burden human operators with saying put your foot here, put your other foot here, put your hand there," he added. — Reuters

source: gmanetwork.com

'Bionic man' makes debut at Washington's Air and Space Museum

A first-ever walking, talking "bionic man" built entirely out of synthetic body parts made his Washington debut on Thursday.

The robot with a human face unveiled at the Smithsonian's National Air and Space Museum was built by London's Shadow Robot Co to showcase medical breakthroughs in bionic body parts and artificial organs.

"This is not a gimmick. This is a real science development," museum director John Dailey said.

The 6-foot-tall (1.83 meter), 170-pound (77-kg) robot is the subject of a one-hour Smithsonian Channel documentary, "The Incredible Bionic Man," airing on Sunday.

A "bionic man" was the material of science fiction in the 1970s when the television show "The Six Million Dollar Man" showed the adventures of a character named Steve Austin, a former astronaut whose body was rebuilt using synthetic parts after he nearly died.

The robot on display at the museum cost $1 million and was made from 28 artificial body parts on loan from biomedical innovators. They include a pancreas, lungs, spleen and circulatory system, with most of the parts early prototypes.

"The whole idea of the project is to get together all of the spare parts that already exist for the human body today - one piece. If you did that, what would it look like?" said Bertolt Meyer, a social psychologist from the University of Zurich in Switzerland and host of the documentary.

The robot was modeled after Meyer, who was born without a hand and relies on an artificial limb. He showed off the bionic man by having it take a few clumsy steps and by running artificial blood through its see-through circulatory system.

"It, kind of, looks lifelike. Kind of creepy," said Paul Arcand, a tourist who was visiting from Boston with his wife.

The robot has a motionless face and virtually no skin. It was controlled remotely from a computer, and Bluetooth wireless connections were used to operate its limbs.

The bionic creation's artificial intelligence is limited to a chatbot computer program, similar to the Siri application on the Apple iPhone, said Robert Warburton, a design engineer for Shadow Robot.

"The people who made it decided to program it with the personality of a 13-year-old boy from the Ukraine," he said. "So, he's not really the most polite of people to have a conversation with."

Assembly began in August 2012 and took three months to finish.

The robot made its U.S. debut last week at New York's Comic Con convention. It will be on display at the museum throughout the fall. — Reuters

source: gmanetwork.com